[You are able to see and listen through your companion, wherever he is.]
"Damn, you are really a blessing, Cawy!" Bradley said, a huge, relieved smile spreading across his face as he tried to grab the crow.
The crow, as if expecting the clumsy attempt, hopped just out of his grasp and let out a sharp caw of irritation. He had no desire to be squashed by Bradley's hug again.
Bradley just clicked his tongue in mild annoyance and turned his focus back inward, to the system screen glowing in his mind.
"Hmmm, now how do I do it? Is there any explanation…?"
[Focus on your connection.]
That was the last line in the description.
"Connection… like the faint bond that I feel from him?"
Bradley closed his eyelids, shutting out the oppressive darkness. He concentrated on that thin, almost invisible thread linking him to the bird. At first, it was just a whisper in his mind, but as he focused, the feeling grew stronger and stronger, until it felt like a thick cord binding their spirits together.
It feels just like the connection I had with the spirits in my past life… Bradley thought.
On his shoulder, the crow's eyes slid shut as well.
Then it came. Rather, he saw it.
His vision, which had grown accustomed to an endless black, shifted as a dull grey light slowly seeped into the crow's—his—eyes.
Their eyelids snapped open at the same time.
A wave of sudden dizziness washed over him, so intense he grabbed his own head, his fingers pressing into his temples. His stomach churned, and he fought back the urge to throw up.
When the world finally settled into focus, the first thing he noticed was the strange change in height. Everything seemed so tall and looming. He felt small and vulnerable.
"Ah, ah, I can see…" he muttered, the words breathy with disbelief.
There, in front of the crow's vision, was a pale boy—or more accurately, himself. He looked like a giant.
"Is this how humans look from every animal's perspective?"
He remembered from biology that animals often saw the world in different colors, their sight not as sharp as a human's. He had expected blues, reds, or maybe even ultraviolet, but instead, he could see everything as clearly as he ever had.
"Well, I'm not on Earth." He smiled to himself. "And damn, I'm really handsome even when I'm in such a tragic situation."
"Now let's try to move my body."
He slowly pushed himself up and tried to take a step forward, but his legs tangled and he landed hard on his backside.
"Fuck, it is really weird trying to control my body from a different point of view…"
Then an idea clicked into place.
"Cawy, fly up to my head, quickly." Bradley pointed a finger at his own scalp.
"Caw?" The crow tilted his head, a picture of confusion, before giving a flutter of dark wings and settling on top of Bradley's hair.
"Now, this will work. It's not perfect, but it will do."
With the crow perched on his head, Bradley had a much better vantage point to watch his surroundings. But it still felt deeply strange to watch his own body move from above, like piloting a clumsy machine. Coordinating his steps while seeing from a different angle was not easy.
"Let's practice, Cawy. Make sure you don't fall from my head—oh right, I need to give you a proper name."
The crow let out a caw that sounded suspiciously like, 'It was about damn time.'
"What do you think about Armageddon, the Destroyer of Worlds?"
"Caw!" The crow shook his head so hard his little body wobbled.
"Yeah, me too. That was way too corny."
Bradley thought for a moment longer, searching for something that fit. "You're black… so I think 'Noir' seems fitting."
The crow fell silent for a moment, as if turning the name over in his mind. Then he spoke in a slightly deep, croaking voice.
"Noir!" he announced, clearly happy with the choice.
"Jesus!" Bradley screamed, his hand flying to his chest. His heart hammered against his ribs.
He had nearly jumped out of his skin hearing the bird speak.
"Fuck! If I didn't know that crows could imitate human language, my heart would have leaped out of my throat."
"Caw! Caw! Caw!" Noir laughed at him, a series of raspy caws at Bradley's expense.
"You're laughing at me? I'll roast you over a fire and eat you, then we'll see who's laughing."
Noir instantly shut his beak and settled deeper into Bradley's hair, making himself comfortable as if it were his nest.
"Don't worry," Bradley smirked. "I don't eat crows."
After saying that, Bradley finally took a proper look at his surroundings through Noir's eyes.
The sky was a blanket of heavy, dark clouds, with no hint of sunlight breaking through. It looked ready to storm, yet the air was dry and still. The ground beneath his feet was cracked and black, like charcoal. There were no buildings like the shadow people had above, no trees, no signs of life at all—just a vast, empty plain swallowed by a thick, grey fog that clung to the horizon.
"This place creeps me out," he said, a cold chill tracing its way down his spine. "For some reason, I have a feeling that there's some kind of human-eating being hiding in that fog."
Bradley looked up, trying to see Noir perched on his head. "Hey, don't you want to scout for me? To see if there's anything I really don't want to meet?"
"Caw!" Noir shook his head firmly.
"Tsk, fine."
Oh, I almost forgot about the relic. Now that he could see, he could finally lay eyes on the sword that not even a deity could draw.
[Susurrus Mortis]
The relic materialized in his hands with a flicker of black sparks. It felt solid and surprisingly heavy, the weight of it cold and certain in his grip.
Bradley's breath caught in his throat.
How couldn't it? The thing in his hands felt ancient, like it was forged by a god themselves.
He stared at the blade—it was a katana.
But not just any katana. Bradley could feel it; the same kind of connection he had with Noir hummed from the blade, but this one was different. The connection was there, a faint pulse, but it wasn't fully established yet.
"A soul-bound weapon…"
The katana was a deep, obsidian black from the tsuka hilt to the very tip of its saya. Strange, elegant runes were carved along the length of the scabbard, their shapes forming words.
"He is silent as darkness, so is his blade," Bradley read the runes aloud, the words feeling heavy on his tongue. "Damn, that sounds cool as fuck, don't you think, Noir?"
"Caw!" Noir agreed with him.
"Now what's left is to draw it…"
He remembered the description, that not even a god could pull the sword from its scabbard. So what chance did he, a mortal, possibly have?
He tightened his grip on the katana and pulled.
"Imagine I suddenly get a message from the system saying I can only use the blade after reaching a certain lev—"
Before he could finish his sentence, the blade slid from its scabbard without a single sound, effortlessly.
What greeted him was a blade of pure, polished black. Just like its scabbard, the metal was a deep, dark obsidian, the color of a starless night.
Bradley reached out and gently touched the flat of the blade with his fingers.
"So sexy…" he murmured.
The moment his skin made contact, an unseen force twisted the blade in his hand, the edge turning just enough to nick the tip of his finger.
"The hell?"
A single drop of blood welled up and touched the dark metal. Instead of dripping off, it was absorbed, vanishing as if the blade had thirstily drunk it. As it did, the katana trembled in his hand, a faint, eager hum vibrating up his arm.
"Is it forming a bond by using my blood?" he murmured, just as a new notification popped into his mind.
[Soul bound weapon bonded to your soul]
"So it was indeed a soul weapon." A smirk tugged at his lips. "That's actually great. No one will be able to steal it from me unless they kill me. I know that much about soul-bound weapons."
The katana in his hand felt different now. The heavy, foreign weight was gone, replaced by a familiar, almost weightless feel, as if it were an extension of his own arm.
He gave the katana an experimental swing.
It made no sound as it cut through the air. No swish, no whisper of movement. It was as silent as the runes on the scabbard had promised.
"Cool…"
He swung it a few more times. It still felt a little weird, coordinating his movements through Noir's high vantage point. He knew it would be difficult to fight like this, but having a weapon was infinitely better than having nothing. Who knew what was waiting for him inside that fog?
Just as he was about to sheath the katana, he noticed something new. There were now words delicately engraved along the dark metal of the blade itself, where there had been none before.
The words read: "Susurrus Mortis."
********
Sorry for not uploading for days, procrastination hit me badly ;-;